Month: September 2019

Newark, N.J., Sep 4, 2019 / 09:00 am (CNA).- Disgraced former cardinal Theodore McCarrick created a “culture of fear and intimidation” at the Seton Hall University seminary, according to a report released by the university on Aug. 27. 

“McCarrick used his position of power as then-Archbishop of Newark to sexually harass seminarians. No minors or other University students were determined to have been affected by McCarrick,” said the statement. 

Seton Hall is sponsored by the Archdiocese of Newark, which McCarrick led from 1988-2000. The Archbishop of Newark serves as president of the university’s board of trustees.

It is one of the oldest diocesan-run Catholic universities in the country and has about 10,000 students, including 6,000 undergraduates. Seton Hall is also home to Immaculate Conception Seminary and St. Andrew’s Hall college seminary.

The “independent, unrestricted review” was announced by interim university president Mary J. Meehan on Aug. 23 last year. It followed an Aug. 17 report published by CNA that detailed a series of allegations made by priests in the Archdiocese of Newark. 

Some of the priest’s accounts related to former archbishop Theodore McCarrick. Others detailed allegations of recent or ongoing behavior at the two seminaries, including a specific allegation concerning a former rector of St. Andrew’s Hall.

The review was conducted by the law firm Lantham & Watkins. It found that while Seton Hall University’s present Title IX policies are “consistent with state and federal law,” they were “not always followed” at Immaculate Conception Seminary or St. Andrew’s Hall.

These policy lapses “resulted in incidents of sexual harassment going unreported to the University,” said the statement. 

“Individuals, communities and parishes across the country have been affected by former archbishop McCarrick and others who have profoundly and forever negatively altered so many lives,” the University statement said.

“The University community prays for all victims of harassment and abuse of any kind. Seton Hall remains committed to advancing its mission and providing seminarians, students, faculty, priests, staff and administrators with a safe and welcoming environment to learn, live and grow.”

Both seminaries and Seton Hall University are now fully in line with Title IX regulations, said the statement. 

The university also announced that it had developed a “series of proactive measures” to address the fallout of the McCarrick scandal among the community, and that “progress” had been made. 

The measures included a commitment to sharing as much of the report’s findings with the university community as is possible under privacy law. 

Additionally, the university announced that a new Chief Compliance and Ethics Officer would be hired to “ensure University-wide adherence to Title IX laws, policies, and practices” and the school will require Title IX training each year for everyone within the Seton Hall community. The school pledged to conduct “prompt reviews” of allegations of sexual harassment. 

The university also said that efforts were underway to “improve the structural relationship” between the main university, Immaculate Conception Seminary, and the Archdiocese of Newark, that will “enhance oversight, control and compliance to prevent recurrence” of past problems.

In October last year, the university was forced to respond to several reports that seminarians had been subjected to harassment on campus by other students, following the public scandal surrounding McCarrick.

“Recently my office has been informed of several instances of foul language and incivility being aimed at members of our Immaculate Conception Seminary,” wrote Meehan in an email sent to the university community on Oct. 15.

This behavior is “unacceptable,” she said, and “cannot be tolerated.”

The August 27 statement said that steps had been taken to “underscore the importance of Immaculate Conception Seminary and St. Andrew’s Seminary to Seton Hall’s Catholic identity,” and work to “better integrate” these schools with the university. 

Seton Hall University’s Board of Regents unanimously endorsed all of the proactive measures.

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Washington D.C., Sep 3, 2019 / 03:05 pm (CNA).- A Catholic elementary school in Nashville has banned the seven books of the Harry Potter series due to concerns the books promote witchcraft and black magic. An exorcist and a Catholic author talked with CNA about the Harry Potter books and the Catholic faith.

“These books present magic as both good and evil, which is not true, but in fact a clever deception,” Fr. Dan Reehil, pastor at Saint Edward School in Nashville, said to parents in an Aug. 28 email.

“The curses and spells used in the books are actual curses and spells; which when read by a human being risk conjuring evil spirits into the presence of the person reading the text,” the priest added.

Reehil said that the books “glorify acts of divination; of conjuring the dead, of casting spells among other acts that are an offense to the virtue of religion — to the love and respect we owe to God alone. Many reading these books could be persuaded to believe these acts are perfectly fine, even good or spiritually healthy.”

Reehil told parents he made the decision to ban the books after consulting exorcists in both the United States and Rome.

Saint Edward teaches students from pre-K through eighth grade.

The Harry Potter books have been controversial since the first book was published in 1997. The American Library Association listed the Harry Potter series as its first-most challenged books in 2001 and 2002. The books were challenged due to claims of being “anti-family,” containing “occult/satanism” content, and violence.

Series author J.K. Rowling has rejected the idea that her books contain anti-Christian messages. In a 2007 interview, the author said that she believed there were parallels between the series’ title character, Harry Potter, and Jesus Christ.

Monsignor Charles Pope, a priest and exorcist of the Archdiocese of Washington, told CNA that “it’s always good to err on the side of caution in these matters,” adding that the decision to remove the books from the library was a “prudential judgment.”

“I think that in times like these we need to be extra cautious, and so as a general rule I’d support it, but I think every individual parent would have to work with their own kids on these matters,” Pope said.

Pope told CNA that he has not read the Harry Potter books nor seen the movies apart from “some excerpts,” and said with a laugh that the series is “way past (his) age.”

Rosamund Hodge, an author of young adult fantasy novels and a lay Dominican, told CNA she thinks concerns about the “magic” in Harry Potter are overblown.

“The magic in these books is about as ‘real’ as Cinderella’s fairy godmother singing ‘bibbidi- bobbidi-boo,’” she told CNA.

“While [Author J.K.] Rowling does occasionally draw from actual occult folklore for some of her world-building…the spells her characters use are usually just fake Latin describing what they’re supposed to do.”

Hodge does not believe there is a risk of children accidentally conjuring evil spirits through repeating the “spells” used in the books.

“Children are about as likely to summon demons by play-acting Harry Potter as they are to accidentally sell their souls by proclaiming ‘Abracadabra!’ while performing card tricks,” Hodge said.

Hodge said that while Rowling “does not write with a Catholic imagination,” she is not concerned with the allegations of “occult” content in the Harry Potter books.

The author told CNA that Catholic children might learn something from the books, even though the series characters do not possess a Catholic worldview.

“I think the proper response is not to ban the books, but to discuss them,” she said. “If children learn how to cope with Harry and his friends sometimes believing the wrong things, perhaps they’ll be prepared for the Thanksgiving dinner where their favorite uncle announces that euthanasia should be legal.”

Pope told CNA that, no matter their decision about Harry Potter, Catholics should guard against any sort of dabbling with the occult or witchcraft.

“Once you’re into actual witchcraft you are in the dark side, since there’s nothing of God in this. It’s a violation of the First Commandment,” he said.

“I mean, I’ve had to look this devil in the face,” the priest added. “He’s very real. He’s very pernicious. He’s also very sly. We need to be sober about his present action in the world.”

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Salina, Kan., Sep 3, 2019 / 02:17 pm (CNA).- In an interview last month with Slate staff writer Ruth Graham, Theodore McCarrick said he doesn’t believe he committed the acts of which he has been accused.

McCarrick, 89, has been in public disgrace since June 2018, when credible allegations of sexual abuse of a minor were made known. He was dismissed from the clerical state in February 2019, after an administrative penal process by which the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith found him guilty of solicitation in the confessional, and sexual abuse of minors and adults, aggravated by abuse of power.

“I’m not as bad as they paint me,” McCarrick told Graham Aug. 14 at the St. Fidelis Friary in Victoria, Kan., about 90 miles west of Salina, where he resides. “I do not believe that I did the things that they accused me of.”

Graham wrote in an article published Sept. 3 that when she challenged McCarrick saying he “makes it sound as if he’s leaving it an open question,” and that it sounded as though he thought it was possible he had committed the acts, he responded no.

McCarrick was Archbishop of Washington from 2000 until 2006.

He resigned from the College of Cardinals in July 2018, and took up residence in the friary that September.

Graham spent at least several days in Victoria, interviewing locals as well as friars who live with McCarrick.

She said McCarrick spoke with her briefly before lunch at the friary. He told her he doesn’t leave the friary, even to enter the adjoining Basilica of St. Fidelis; a condition of his residence is that he remain on the grounds of the friary. He indicated that he spends much of his time in the chapel and the library.

McCarrick discussed in particular the accusations by James Grein that he had solicited him during confession: “The thing about the confession, it’s a horrible thing. I was a priest for 60 years, and I would never have done anything like that … That was horrible, to take the holy sacrament and to make it a sinful thing.”

The former cleric told Graham that he thinks men who said he abused them while they were seminarians during weekend trips to his New Jersey beach house “were encouraged” to develop similar stories, attributing this encouragement to unnamed “enemies.”

“There were many who were in that situation who never had any problems like that,” he said.

McCarrick also addressed the claims of Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò, emeritus apostolic nuncio to the US, who said McCarrick’s alleged sexual misconduct had been known to some Vatican officials for years, eventually leading to a restriction on the archbishop’s ministry by Benedict XVI and a subsequent restoration of McCarrick’s place as a papal advisor by Pope Francis.

The now-layman said Viganò “was talking as a representative of the far right, I think,” adding, “I don’t want to say he’s a liar, but I think some of the bishops have said that he was not telling the truth.”

Father Christopher Popravak, the former provincial of the Capuchin’s St. Congrad province, told Graham that McCarrick will likely remain at St. Fidelis Friary, saying: “It’s become impossible for him to move because no one will have him.”

According to Graham, McCarrick had hoped to return to the east coast, but told her, “I don’t know how many years are in my calendar. One tries one’s best to accept where one is.”

The former cardinal said he receives little mail, and “the vast majority of the mail I get is looking for some help. I don’t have a lot of money, but I try to be helpful. It’s what you’re supposed to do.”

Once he was dismissed from the clerical state, McCarrick’s room and board of about $500 a month were no longer paid for by the Archdiocese of Washington, and he offered to pay out of pocket.

According to Graham, Fr. John Schmeidler, pastor of the Basilica of St. Fidelis, declined McCarrick’s offer.

Fr. Popravak said: “I know that itself could be construed as problematic, like the church is continuing to cover for him or harbor him. But we’re not attempting to profit from this. This is simply an attempt for us to show mercy.”

Graham wrote that McCarrick participates in the friary’s daily routine, including Mass, breakfast, and evening prayers, as well as weekly confession.

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